The Problem:
Have you ever had a client come to you in a state of desperation, begging for help to remove a blog post that ranks for their business name, and portrays them in less than a positive light?
Or perhaps you had a very contentious break-up with an old flame, and they've since decided to air their beefs with you in a more public forum, and these complaints now appear every time you type your name into Google. Maybe you merely made a mistake one evening after a few too many beverages, but the proof now appears in video form online and as a result has become part of your public resume.
Edit: my friend Glen Allsopp just did a post highlighting 3 women who just took such action ... its a good read A New Wave of Reputation Management Issues.
Remember this fiasco ... Gov. Eliot Spitzer's Flame
Truth be told ... its happens all the time! Its becoming a whole lot more common too with the growth in personal blogging, and people beginning to understand that THEY ARE MEDIA. The service is referred to as Online Reputation Management (ORM).
The reality of the matter is that without legal injunctions and the like, the piece cannot be removed from the search results entirely. In many cases, legal tactics often have the exact opposite effect to that intended, and bring even more attention to the issue. Sure, you could also try Google Bowling it, but you're likely to just further strengthen the post's positioning. So, what can you do?
The Solution:
Here's a relatively simple solution, that will work a large percentage of the time ... unless you're dealing with a more knowledgeable individual where more advanced tactics are needed. You need to bump the negative listing down in the search results to progressively lower positions, reducing the likelihood that it will ever be found. Keep in mind, most people never go beyond the 1st page of search results.
This can often be done by building a profile on various sites. The profile name should be the exact term/phrase that the negative piece is ranking for. Here's a list of 50+ such sites you can use:
1. Digg
2. LinkedIn
3. Twitter
4. Stumbleupon
5. Facebook
6. Propeller
7. Magnolia
8. Jaiku
9. Simpy
10. Technorati
11. coRank
12. YouTube
13. BlogCatalog
14. Zimbio
15. HubPages
16. Reddit
17. UPCHUCKr
18. BlogMad
19. Curbly
20. Flickr
21. PublicBlend
22. Bumpzee
23. Pownce
24. ViewZoo
25. PeekYou
26. Hugg.com
27. Connotea
28. BlinkList
29. BlogFlux
30. Netvous.com
31. Plime
32. MyBlogLog
33. Giggg.com
34. DotNetKicks
35. Diigo
36. CoComment
37. LiveJournal
38. Faves
39. Indianpad
40. Blogmarks.net
41. MySpace
42. Mixx
43. ZiiTrend
44. FriendFeed
45. MetaCafe
46. Last.fm
47. ZippyVideos
48. Quizilla.com
49. Kirtsy
50. Photobucket
51. Deals
52. Agentb
53. BlogSpot
54. HuffingtonPost
If all goes well, merely building a profile on some of these will push the negative piece to the second page. If not, you'll have to get more aggressive tactics. I've blogged about some of these Intermediate Tactics in this post How to Bury Negative Online Mentions of You - Intermediate Level Tactics
This is a good start for now though. Try it out with a few, and see how long before your profile appears in the search results for the profile name selected.
In the end ... these sites can help protect your reputation from unreasonable ex-partners, angry clients, and others who wish to cause you harm online.
This works by the way! Good post Jeff
This is a great idea. It is usually used to increase your footprint however.
Nice list of resources, I’m currently putting together something similar but not on the exact same lines.
Thanks for mentioning me, Stumbled and Sphunn 😉
darn. foiled again. 😉
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Jeff,
Thank you for visiting http://deansguide.wordpress.com.
First a word of thanks–Thank You!
I am a real estate consultant and help industry professionals build their blog presence online.
My biggest pushback is the fact that 90% of the industry pros do not want to take on the task to blog.
When I show them what reputation management means to their public perception, I will show them this article as a tool to “defuse” the poor review(s).
Excellent!
dean guadagni
Great list Jeff! thanks. It’s good to know which sites work best for reputation management.
[…] Jeff Quipp from Search Engine People has a great post on 50+ Sites to Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company. […]
My ex-gf asked a question on a forum about a plastic surgery procedure she had done. Turns out that post ranked #1 for her name…she was not happy. Last I checked it had been removed, but this info can be useful for private persons and companies alike 🙂
@Hobo … thanks Sean! Yup it does work well.
@seo … why not serve 2 purposes with one strategy? More efficient!
@ Glen … I’m looking forward to seeing your next post about it then!
@spostareduro … haha good one!
@dean … thanks Dean. Make sure you forward them to the piece I posted this am on the SEW Blog about intermediate tactics too (http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/080515-110003).
@ Utah … thanks Jordan!
@Kiowa … such an innocent thing, and voila. It sure can and will happen. Thanks!
@ Kiowa – now that is funny!
[…] Jeff Quipp from Search Engine People has a great post on 50+ Sites to Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company. […]
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Unfortunately, without backlinks to the profiles themselves most of them will not rank well. Especially if the term is competitive.
Some will, some wont, and get ready for a roller coaster b/c the profiles will jump around like a Hot Tamale. 9especially if you have no backlinks.
Another tidbit, if you are using two words, make sure you use a “-” if the site allows it in the username, since the page name typically will be site.com/user/user-profile vs. site.com/user/userprofile
Sometimes comments on really popular sites (if you use your name) will start ranking high for ya. The best social media sites for rep management allow you to use your full name (with space) as your user name and will appear in the page title, Flickr is one.
We have actually been recommending a proactive approach using many of these sites to all of our clients – even if they are squeeky clean. And it doesn’t hurt to get some links that way either 🙂
@ Brian Chappell … exactly right Brian, good advice about the hyphen. Right also about backlinks … which I covered in the follow up piece (http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/080515-110003). Links are needed, though often just internal links!
@ Linda … yes. I find it really unsettling when that happens. Makes you really consider each and every comment.
@ Arnie … agreed completely. Its a good idea to grab profiles for your own terms before someone else does.
[…] Quipp at Search Engine People followed this with his list of over 50 sites you can use to help deflect the impact of negative publicity on the internet. Back to Glen at ViperChill as he demonstrates some of the dangers of upsetting […]
[…] 50+ Sites To Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company! […]
That is quite the list of social sites, many of which I don’t know. My angle is to start blogging on as many popular sites as possible to bring them to the top. Will go check out the sites above.
[…] Yesterday I published a post on the Search Engine People site titled 50+ Sites to Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company!. […]
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[…] Ironically if you think about it, a recent slew of (intriguing) articles teaching tactics to defend reputation disasters could actually empower evil losers to pull the trigger with cunning focus and […]
Hey Jeff… one question. If the phrase you’re working on is a firstname, lastname pair, would you use a dash “-” for the username?
sam-smith
julie-andrews
…or…
samsmith
julieandrews
I’m thinking dashes….but wanted your opinion.
Jeff,
This is such an outstanding post that you REALLY got me thinking. Thanks for the veritable clinic sharing your tactics used to protect clients.
Those are some nice tips. Its amazing what I found then I typed in my name in Google, posts i’d made on forums ages ago.
@Marketing Man – some of these sites are definitely more obscure and not quite a effective at bumping listings as others. Guess it just depends how far down you wish to push a post, and how much time you can invest.
@Scott – good question Scott … I typically like to use a hyphen in those situations.
@Marty – thanks! As you acknowledged in your post … just so long as these tactics are used for good and not bad.
@MakeMoneyBlogging – yeah, you can find some dated and odd stuff just typing in your own name.
Nice post, Jeff. I have heard about this tactic from a SEO business partner. Now do you have any thoughts how we can go about it if we have to work on a product and not a person?
@Palin email me at jeff at searchenginepeople.com to chat more.
Great post! Thanks for sharing all these
insights, tips and resources. I will
surely take note of all of these. I have
in fact bookmarked this. Thanks!
[…] 50+ Sites To Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company! | Search Engine People Blog (tags: reputation management online branding) […]
Hmm, interesting. Reputation management is something I’ve never heard of before. It makes sense, but in a scary sort of way. Maybe this makes a good case for keeping your personal name, and business branding name as separate entities.
great list, thanx for sharing
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This is great list, some of them i already used. Many of them still new to me.
[…] Reputation Management – as my previous post on the subject (Reputation 50+ Posts to Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company ) suggests, by developing and building out profiles on numerous social media sites, you can often […]
Very nice and helpful list but please add Google Plus in this list
Great post! I always thing that your reputation make yourself. But some people for one or other reason problably want hurt you. But the scandals not only are at internet. I found another services like rapleaf.com that you can use to mantain your reputation at internet.
Aww, this makes defamation no fun!
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Andy Beal on Marketing Pilgrim does some fantastic work on reputation management, well worth a look there.
There is some great stuff on Marketing Pilgrim on reputation management, well worth a read.
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Thats why if one has ambition one should always look upon his reputation in order to keep it.
such incidences are happening a lot these days……thanks for these tips.
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If people really do their research behind a company, I’m sure they can find the truth: if it is legit or not. Digg won’t help you where the Better Business Bureau can.
I have different tactics to tackle ORM, however i am sure your tactic is good enough to throw bad reviews to at least the 3rd page.
@ Singapore – Ahhhh… hammering dofollow lists…. I remember it well. 🙂
Well i wouldn’t use the word hammering, it is more of a contribution and sharing of knowledge. Hobo you do have a good memory, but got to try my new targeted keywords for SERPs purpose. 🙂
Wow this is a really good idea. You can’t take back the mistake or the negative reviews, but you can hide it in the depths of the search engine
thanks for the list, it is worth looking through
Never give it a serious thought, but I surely believe your online reputation is became more important than it was before.
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Great source!
I will definitely use some of the sites from the list.
jeff thats really a long list and yeah even if alone you are on digg fp lacs of people gona know whats going on. i appreciate the idea of this post very wise 🙂
This is really a great list not only for turning the negative posts but also for promoting your online presence.
[…] a fantastic article on online reputation management “50+ Sites To Help You Bury Negative Posts About You or Your Company” Jeff Quipp states: “Keep in mind, most people never go beyond the first page of search […]
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Thanks for the article!
I think I know someone who has this problem..with his own name on Google.
Such a nice post Jeff, its really very helpful for me and for all thanx.
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this list surely will help. Also you can write an article about the company in ezine. this would be a boost.
For this method to really be effective, you would also want to make sure that the anchor text you use to link to your “new profile” for the competing keywords is the same as the one with the negative search results.
.-= Diamond Prices recently posted: How much is an engagement ring =-.
This really works, and the history of this article is a testament to that. I remember reading this almost three years ago, and it was relevant then, 100x now. Thanks Jeff, this article is one of very few that I’ve gone back to time and again to teach clients, and even my own company, how to CYA. Great work!
Great advice, however i NEVER submit the same article content to more that 10 of those listed above. Instead i write more content, BUT it works lol.
Cheers for the info Jeff, keep em coming!
Great post, Jeff! Very useful for professionals who are changing jobs. SOmetimes, lots of unexpected things await for them when they google their names 🙂
Saving your list for the future reference
Cheers,
Olga
Hi! My name is Blair Pettrey – try googling/binging that! AWFUL! That being said; Whilst mine and others attempts to bury negative results for “Blair Pettrey” have succeeded with bing.com search results; google won’t budge. What am I doing wrong? I am following/linking/posting/building websites/posting on forums/have all of my linkedin/aboutme/facebook/twitter/emails/websites/etcetcetc linked to each other etc…. What the heck am I doing wrong